


Sometimes Salvation

by RecoveringTheSatellites



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Don't copy to another site, F/M, One Shot, i wouldn't know how to tag this if i tried
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-06
Updated: 2019-05-06
Packaged: 2020-02-27 09:32:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18736348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RecoveringTheSatellites/pseuds/RecoveringTheSatellites
Summary: Some lives are small and lonely and broken, but that does not mean that they are lost.





	Sometimes Salvation

**Author's Note:**

> Today, on the ride home from work, THIS popped into my head.  
> i don't even know what this is.  
> It just came out of nowhere and would not be denied.
> 
> (On the bright side, i *finally* managed a oneshot.)

 

 

His whole life has been a string of empty rooms.

For years.

For decades.

This is no different.

 

He gets up before dawn and makes coffee.

_Things you can do with one hand._

Sits down on a threadbare arm chair in this, his current empty room, and stares out of the window. He can see parts of the opposite building. A piece of a flat highrise roof. A few windows. None of them lit.

The coffee stops percolating and he pours a cup.

_Things you can do with one hand._

Goes back to his chair, stares as he drinks. Seeing nothing.

When he is done, he leaves the apartment quietly, bucket in hand. The cleaning supplies rattle inside. It is almost too loud.

 

He washes storefront windows.

_Things you can do with one hand._

Down six blocks on one side of the street, one block a week, and then back up the other, rain or shine. There are very few owners who don't want his services. He's cheap. And storefronts are a bitch to keep clean.

When he's done they pay him in cash. They don't talk to him much. He hardly talks at all.

 

He walks back during the afternoon rush hour and watches life happening around him. Outside of him. He sees people on bikes _(things you can't do with one hand)_ , people on skateboards, people walking dogs, people pulling children behind them _(things you can)_.

His entire world is divided down that line.

Things you can do with one hand.

And things you can't.

 

Then he goes back to his apartment, puts something frozen in the microwave, and stares out the window until he falls asleep.

Just an empty life in an empty room.

All his tomorrows are just yesterdays, wearing new clothes.

 

 

And then one day he sees a new storefront.

 

There's a bookstore now, where a falafel place used to be; a falafel place whose owner never wanted his windows washed. He stands staring at the new store for a long time before he works up the courage to enter it. He hasn't had to offer his services in such a long time.

He isn't sure he still knows how. To talk.

 

A bell rings as he pushes open the door. A blonde woman looks up from the counter. She has green eyes and her smile, her smile---

It's like staring at the sun. Blinding. And infinitely painful.

 

„Can I help you?“ Her voice is clearer than the bell. There is laughter in it, and joy and warmth. It hurts almost as much as her smile.

He has to take a moment to find his voice. To remember why he is here. To remember who he is.

He holds up his bucket, loaded with the squeegee and rags and window cleaner spray bottles.

„I do storefronts,“ he mumbles. Her kind eyes and her easy smile are locked on him and god, it _hurts_. So much. „You're on my route, if you want it. Thirty bucks a pop. Once every three months.“

 

It's more than he has said the whole week. Probably longer than that.

 

„Oh!“ She smiles again, and he wishes she would stop, because it is so painful. „That's fantastic. You're hired. Can you start today?“

He nods.

„There's plaster dust on them, from getting the store ready,“ she goes on. „I hope that's not a problem? I can pay you extra for that.“

He shakes his head. If she only knew what he has been forced to wipe from glass panes over the years. Urine and semen and saliva and greasepaint and even blood once. Plaster dust is the least of it.  
  


„No, that's alright,“ he manages to say. But he can't look at her anymore.

„Great,“ she answers, and holds out her hand. „My name is Emma. Emma Swan.“

None of the other store owners ever introduced themselves. He doesn't know any of their names, and they don't know his. He hasn't shaken a hand in years.

Years.

But you can do it with one hand.

 

Slowly he lifts his right hand and reluctantly meets her eyes again. Her grip is firm, and she shakes like she means it. And then waits, patiently, still holding his hand.

 

For one brief moment his life wraps around their fingers. It's not just his first handshake in years.

It's his first human touch in years.

He has forgotten what it's like.

But he knows that it did not use to be painful. Kind eyes and smiles and skin on skin. But now, now it's excrutiating. He can hardly breathe.

„Killian Jones,“ he manages to whisper and thank god – she lets him go.

 

 

When he is done with her window, he steels himself for a good minute before he goes back inside.

She sits at the counter, reading a book. When she looks up she smiles that blinding smile again.  
„Caught me revisiting an old favorite,“ she says, „instead of working. Then again--“ she winks, „I do own the store.“

She closes the book and reaches below the register for a petty cash box. As she counts out his money he can't help but look at the book's title.

 

_Charles Bukowski_

_You Get So Alone Sometimes That It Just Makes Sense_

 

„Wha---“ The sound is out before he can stop himself. There is his life, his _goddamn life_ , wrapped into one sentence.

„Have you read it?“ Her voice is gentle. „It's a book of poems. From a wild, brilliant, ruined, angry, and thoroughly riveting madman.“ It sounds fond, like she is describing a friend. A good friend.

She holds out two bills, and he shoves them in his pocket.

„Would you like to borrow it?“ Still that kind lilt to her voice.

He shakes his head. „You're a store. Not a library.“

„I know,“ she laughs. He can't tell if it has gotten more or less painful. „But as I have mentioned, I own the store. And,“ her voice drops to a whisper, her eyes dancing, her mouth still smiling. _More painful. Definitely more painful._ „I happen to own this book. It's been mine since college.“ She grins and winks again. „You know, back in the late seventeenth century.“

The laugh that hacks out of him takes them both by surprise.

She puts the book in a bag. „Take it. Bring it back whenever.“

He cringes.

He already has to carry the bucket.

And then she just loops the handles of the bag around his left arm, _his left arm_ , which just happens to be angled out instead of hidden behind his back ( _WhenDidThatHappen?_ ), slides it past his blunted wrist and right up to the crook of his elbow---

and he wants to scream

he wants to run

he wants to fling the bag far, far away

but he just manages to nod and flee the premises at nothing more than a few fast-paced steps.

 

Outside he shudders and bends over and can't catch his breath for endless minutes.

 

 

When he gets home he is agitated.

Pins and needles prick his skin all over.

He puts the bag with the book down next to the door, as far away as possible from the few things he owns. He puts on a pot of coffee just to have something to do, and when he goes to his bedroom to change, something crinkles in his pocket.

He pulls out money.

Two bills. Her two bills. Two twenties.

She paid him extra.

For the plaster dust.

 

 

He can't sleep.

He feels hollow.

His room has never felt this empty. It echoes through the empty caverns of all the thoughts he won't let himself think.

It echoes through his empty days and his empty nights.

 

 

 

He doesn't go back. One week bleeds into the next, and he doesn't go back and he doesn't open the book. He's halfway down the storefronts on the opposide side of the street and he's starting to get afraid of what will happen when her turn comes around.

 

He's restless and edgy.

He's afraid she'll smile at him again.

He's afraid that she won't.

He thinks of more things he can't do with one hand.

Thinks of more things he can.

 

The afternoon he cleans the storefronts directly opposite her store, she comes out and brings him a cup of coffee.

Just appears by his side, smiling that wide, painful smile, holding a paper cup out to him.

„You looked like you could use a break,“ she says. As if people looked at him. As if people _saw_ him.

 

Pedestrians flow around them as he puts down his squeegee and takes the cup. His hand shakes. She pays no attention to it.

„Thank you,“ he whispers.

She studies him carefully. „You really do look tired,“ she says. „Are you working too hard?“

He almost laughs.

People don't ask about him.

 

The irony of it is that he doesn't even need to work. He has a settlement. Which is just sitting in the bank, earning interest. It's probably worth more now than it was when he got it. It was an exchange: money for an appendage. He can't bring himself to spend it.

That is why he works.

And a life of empty rooms doesn't require much.

Her hand comes out and touches his arm. „Get some sleep,“ she says. „I'll bring you another cup tomorrow.“

She squeezes his bicep before she lets go. It burns like fire.

 

She brings him coffee without fail every day. Two blocks down, three blocks, and then up the other side.

Day after day.

Week after week.

Her smile still hurts, but now it's also painful to lose it. To nod and smile back and then watch her go.

He tosses and turns through his nights, waiting for day to come, waiting for her.

Each small touch is like a lifeline, reeling him in to the shore.

He's been adrift for so long, he's afraid of coming back, but he can't not.

He can't not.

 

 

And then one evening he gets out the book.

It falls open to a page near the very beginning, and the title reads, _Beasts Bounding Through Time_.

The language is not eloquent, not flowery, nor flowing.

It is simple and visceral and vulgar and _raw_ , and he stares and he stares; and can't go past that page, can't go past those words, those words, _those words_....

 

Something inside him bends and bends until it snaps, and before he knows it, he is up and running. Clutching the book.

He runs down the street, one block after another, and he gets to her store just as she flips the sign CLOSED.

She sees him, chest heaving, struggling to breathe, and she opens the door and lets him in.

He can't speak.

She simply takes his left arm, above the elbow, and it's so painful he nearly explodes; and yet he never, ever wants it to stop.

She pulls him over to the couch and pushes him to sit down, and then sits down herself and just waits.

  
„You,“ he starts, and then words desert him.

She remains silent, smiling at him, and it's blinding and excrutiating and the most wonderful thing in his entire world. He holds up the book, finger still on the page.  
„This,“ he says, and he can't help the way his voice breaks, „this....“

He takes a deep breath. „You--- how did you know?“

Her smile never falters and he can feel tears in his eyes. „How did I know what?“

„How did you know me?“

„You're somewhat of an open book, Killian Jones. And I do know books. I sell them for a living.“

 

He sobs a laugh and she takes the book from him and then holds his hand. Tightly.

He shudders and falters and she just moves over and wraps her arms around him.

Lets him tremble and shake and fight to draw breath and just hugs him and hugs him until her touch no longer burns.

Until her smile no longer hurts.

 

Until he feels hope for the first time in forever.

 

He finally looks up at her, at those green eyes and their soft look and sighs.

„Emma,“ he says, and it sounds like a question.

„Killian,“ she says, and it's all the answer he needs.

 

And his life is no longer an empty room.

 

 

 

 


End file.
